Friday's What the Heck/ It's About Time

 I often ponder in advance the subject of my next blog.  This time, I got to thinking about why I blog. At the end of the day, I hope to achieve by blogging a collection of stories, memories, which I am completely grateful for. 

Indeed, it goes without saying that I enjoy blogging. But more importantly as in my title “My Magnificent life” it clearly is about my life.  My experiences. My musings.  My interest. My opinions.  (I just realized that, I, a person who strives to avoid attracting attention to myself, have devoted an entire blog all about me! Ironic.) That is enough about me. :)

May was a busy month. My mom celebrated her 93^rd birthday and it leads me to contemplate the issue of time.  Not old age, nor the balance of life and death.  But in particular, about why time appears to speed up as we get older, or is it just me?  I remember, as a child each summer day seemed to go on for an eternity and that was okay with me.   What happened? When did our perception of time change?

For me, suddenly one day I noticed, days became weeks, and then months.  Time just began to collapse into a blur.  Trying to hold on to the minutes before they vanished is impossible. It is like pouring water on hot rocks; it sizzles, vaporizes, and is gone.

And, in a nutshell, that is why it is nice to be able to go back and read my past blog posts.  Blogging is my way of capturing snippets of my life, which if left to chance might disappear into the abyss.  Usually, I'll pick a quite time at the end of the year to pick events from the  previous year. More often than not, a smile will grace my face but sometimes tears too as I go back into time and read various posts.  It is a glimpse into my life, souvenirs of the good and bad. 

That said, already, I feel like I’ve done a whole summer’s worth of activities and it’s not yet the end of May. 

When the family gathered in the same city earlier this month for my mom’s birthday party, this presented a perfect opportunity to spend an evening with my five beautiful sisters.  This was a rare occasion because it seems that someone is always missing at family events.  Reconnecting and reminiscing about time past and celebrating current successes produced precious laughter.   Moreover, big sisters keep you real.  Lol!  (An interesting observation, my brothers don’t seem to make an attempt to get together.  Is this a male thing, I wonder?) 

The following day, a huge birthday party!  I admit being a bit of a control freak (read, bossy!) and I was somewhat taken a back when I discovered no one was in charge of coordinating the event.  How is that possible, no boss, I thought? How will people know who is responsible for this or that and what type of food to bring, this being a potluck an all?  And, it didn’t help my state of mind either when the wild meat for the soup was delivered still frozen and unprepared at 1 pm.  Yikes!!! 

In the end, it all came together like magic, everyone pitched in and did what needed to be done and brought perfect yummy dishes.  I have an awesome family!  

Mama (as she is known to everyone) had no idea what we planned as she had a small party on her actual birthday.   She entered the Friendship Centre and was greeted with an explosion of applause and happy birthday sung by everyone!  Clearly, by the look of her it was a major surprise.

As a gift to her I created our family tree.  It was an amazing process for me researching seven generations of family. As I read the research reports, I imagined the era of that individual person. I was especially blown away when I wrapped my mind around how much has changed in the world. Particularly, our technology! I tried to imagine what my great, great, grandmother would think if she knew I was researching her lineage on a computer, viewing it later on an ipad and sending electronic files on my iphone to the internet in real-time so those who could not be in attendance would feel like they were part of the celebration.  In terms of time, this progress is but a wee blimp in the history of time, and yet to my mom, it is real science fiction.

When printed, the descendant report was over ten feet long with 258 people and 93 families.   I can’t imagine how mama felt knowing she is responsible for a community hall full of people, not to mention those who were absent! Interestingly, her mother was an only child.  How awesome, huh!

May is a month for family birthdays, and another birthday surprise for my dear special young ladies.  Thinking up surprise is what I really enjoy doing but sometimes I collaborate with someone and in this instance I needed Jenelle’s help. It was killing her to keep the secret I know, but so worth it! What do you get a budding contortionist? Well a contortionist dream holiday, that’s what!

Later, on the  May long weekend, on a gorgeous sunny day, we attended a small intimate wedding at a beautiful historical venue. 

My bias to be sure is small weddings, and this wedding was perfect!  The bride looked as all brides do on their day, absolutely radiant.   Apparently, the groom said to his bride as they were planning the wedding,” A maximum forty people and if one extra person is invited, the wedding would have to go on without me.”  The bride must have taken him literally because there were no more than forty people in attendance.  Well, that we knew of anyway.  Because apparently this historical building had a resident ghost who is known to make an appearance each day at 2:30, but no one at the wedding actually saw her.   

Finally this week, I completed (actually I co-coordinated the riverfront landscaping) including a spot for late night bonfires at the cottage.  It looks spectacular! 

Wow, this was a hectic month! It’s no wonder time appeared to whiz on by quick like lighting.